“William Nichols being duly sworn on his oath states my name is William Nicholls I am Sub Inspector of Police stationed at Oak Park – I met the deceased for the first time on the Woolgar on the evening of the 12th instant. I was patrolling the Woolgar with my detachment – He stated to me he had followed the tracks of blacks to within 12 miles of the Woolgar, on the 13th we shifted our camp two miles above the reefs, on the 14th- I went into the reefs with one trooper and Mr Kaye followed me, on our return to our camp acting on a requisition received from the diggers to have the blacks turned out of the field I and Mr Kaye and one trooper interviewed a small mob of blacks who were camped on the river within sight of the reefs – we assured the blacks of no violence being offered them and tried to persuade them to come to our camp, where we intended getting all the blacks we could and then taking them off the field quietly – we succeeded in assuring the blacks of our good intentions and they consented to come to our camp we accordingly stated as we were going along, I not trusting the blacks so implicitly as Mr Kaye suggested that he should ride on to our camp and send back three troopers to help to bring in the mob. Mr Kaye asked me to go as I was riding the best horse. I did so and sent back three troopers directly – I remained at the camp giving one of the troopers my horse – about quarter of an hour afterwards Trooper Sandy, who was riding my horse returned and told me Mr Kaye was killed – He said “Blackfellow been kill him marmy” I then mounted all my own troopers and Mr Kaye’s and I proceeded to the spot where Mr Kaye was speared – I saw Mr Kaye’s body it was lying on the ground there – I left Mr Kaye where I last saw him alive within two miles and a half of our camp – His body was lying about half a mile nearer my camp – I saw a wound on the right breast, it had not penetrated the other side, a very small wound it was a spear wound – the body was warm but quite dead – a spear was shown to me found by Trooper Jerry there was blood on the spear – the point of the spear was broken off where it appeared to have struck a hone on the other side – from the blood it appeared to have penetrated about ten inches or more – Mr Smith was with the body, when I came up – when I left Mr Kaye alive only one Trooper named Sambo was with him – I left him alive between 1/2 past one and two oclock in the afternoon when I saw him dead it was a little after two oclock. – I had seen two mobs of black and heard of three more mobs on the Woolgar I estimated there were between four or five hundred in the field – The diggers sent me a requisition complaining of their pilfering in consequence of that I determined to remove them from the field – Mr Kaye had no arms with him when I left him his trooper had no arms – he was endeavouring to put confidence into the blacks – I counted nine big Blackfellows in the mob when I left there were a good many more gins & picanniny’s with them – they all had spears – I saw Mr Kaye’s body buried next morning about ten in the morning Mr Smith and a number of diggers were present Mr Smith knows Mr Kaye’s age and birth place I believe”